A songbook of progressive/protest music for the twenty-first century. Dozens of anthems from 1970 to the present, from around the world, all with an essential "hook" that makes them ideal for progressive mobilizations and celebrations.

Sunday, January 22, 2012

"Rise Up" - The Parachute Club

The funky, joyful "Rise Up," by the Toronto band The Parachute Club, is a little-known early-eighties gem ripe for a revival. As a pro-peace, pro-feminist, pro-LGBT anthem, it's hard to beat -- one of those songs that welcomes everyone to the party. At heart, it's a general hymn to diversity and the power of solidarity, easily adaptable to diverse progressive circumstances:

(Rise up rise up)

Oh rise and share your power

(Rise up rise up)

Were dancing into the sun

(Rise up rise up)

It's time for celebration

(Rise up rise up)

Spirit's time has come

We want lovin' we want laughter again

We want heartbeat

We want madness to end

We want dancin'

We want to run in the streets

We want freedom to live in this peace

We want power

We want to make it ok

Want to be singin' at the end of the day

Children to breathe a new life

We want freedom to love who we please

A recent photo of Lorraine Segato, lead
singer of The Parachute Club

Talkin' 'bout the right time to be workin' for peace

Wantin' all the tension in the world to ease

This tightrope's gotta learn how to bend

We're makin' new plans

Gonna start it again

(Rise up rise up)

Oh rise and share your power

(Rise up rise up)

Were dancing into the sun

(Rise up rise up)

It's time for celebration

(Rise up rise up)

Spirit's time has come

For Canadian progressives, "Rise Up" has additional and somewhat melancholy connotations. It was the favorite song of Jack Layton, late leader of the center-left New Democratic Party, one of Canada's most (read: only) respected and beloved politicians. Layton used it as his campaign song, as well as at his wedding to Toronto NDP member of Parliament Olivia Chow. And it was the song that Parachute Club singer Lorraine Segato performed at his state funeral in Toronto in October 2011.

Here's the original version of "Rise Up," from Parachute Club (1983):

The video for "Rise Up," filmed on Toronto streets:

Other Resources

Thanks to my friend Catherine Novak for suggesting this song.

Available on The Parachute Club's self-titled album (1983), which appears to be out of print, and on Wild Zone: The Essential Parachute Club (2006), track 1.

The Parachute Club performing the song to close the Toronto Pride concert (2008):

In 1999, McCain somehow secured rights to use "Rise Up" in (gasp) a pizza commercial. Here's an entertaining account of how Lorraine Segato then kicked ass. In it, Segato describes the song as "about sexual diversity and sexual equality." "'Rise Up', she explains, grew out of Toronto's multiracial gay and lesbian community of the early '80s. In a time of bathhouse raids and emerging fears about a new, deadly, sexually transmitted disease, Queen Street West formed the nexus of the hip gay music scene. Parachute Club opened the Bamboo Club across the street from the new MuchMusic and the band's poppy tune quickly became an anthem for the gay community, often identified with coming out of the closet. Its catchy hook, however, would also make it an anthem for political groups unaware that the rousing refrain was not a call to arms, but rather, well, a call to arms. As the song goes, 'We want freedom, to love who we please'. Ms. Segato has heard Rise Up played at Liberal party conventions, at marches to protest Chinese human-rights abuses, abortion rallies, and even on Christian radio stations in Europe."

Adam Jones, Ph.D.

We need new anthems. "We Shall Overcome" and "If I Had a Hammer" and "Give Peace a Chance" all had their moment, but they now sound dated and even clichéd. This blog proposes a new songbook (see list below) -- with selections from 1970 to the present -- for the activists of the twenty-first century. To qualify as anthems, these tracks must (a) be broadly positive/ progressive in content; (b) have an essential and substantial "hook" (a line, a verse, a chorus) that could realistically be sung by many progressive people at once, whether for protest or celebration; (c) reflect the ever more globalized world of activism, which means I'm always on the lookout for diverse materials from the Global South; and (d) be appealing to me personally, or why would I be doing this? I'll be blogging over fifty of my own proposals, and I welcome suggestions for further entries. You can share your comments at the end of each entry, and email me with your feedback. Please also let me know if you find any broken links. Now -- let's raise our voices! Adam

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